LTREB Renewal: Woody seedling dynamics, climate, and species coexistence in a wet tropical forest

在物种多样的潮湿热带森林中，了解决定树种丰度和数量的因素仍然是生态学的一个重大挑战。使这一挑战更加复杂的是，人们认识到，随着气温升高和降雨模式的变化，热带森林预计会发生变化。这项对热带森林生物多样性的长期研究通过关注树木生命的重要阶段来应对这一挑战，包括成熟树木的种子和幼苗生产，这些幼苗的生长和存活，以及成熟树木的生长和存活。该项目延续了对哥斯达黎加五个林分的幼苗和成熟树木调查的13年记录，目标是开发森林再生关键方面的模型-幼苗生产、传播、生长和存活-以应对光照、土壤养分、降雨和温度。树木的生命周期通常很长，有些物种每12年或更长时间才繁殖一次，许多树木可以存活数百年。因此，作为这项研究的一部分，收集的长期数据对于捕捉树木生命周期的更大部分和跨越天气条件的变化至关重要。该研究的数据和模型将确定物种共存的主要机制，有助于解释热带森林异常高的多样性，提高对管理树种丰富度的因素的理解将有助于预测森林对环境变化的反应，这对木材生产，野生动物栖息地和森林碳储存至关重要。研究结果还将改善对工厂上一些最多样化的社区如何应对气温升高、降雨减少和化学污染物沉积增加的预测。该项目将教育和培训学生，公开提供有价值的长期数据，并通过科学论坛和网站的活动促进公众的科学教育。

Understanding the factors that govern the abundance and number of tree species in species-diverse wet tropical forests remains a major challenge in ecology. Complicating this challenge is the knowledge that tropical forests are expected to change as they become warmer and as rainfall patterns change. This long-term study of tropical forest biodiversity tackles this challenge by focusing on the important phases of a tree's life, including seed and seedling production by mature trees, the growth and survival of those seedlings, and the growth and survival of mature trees. The project extends a 13-year record of seedling and mature tree surveys in five forest stands in Costa Rica, with the goal of developing models of critical aspects of forest regeneration - seedling production, dispersal, growth, and survival - in response to light, soil nutrients, rainfall, and temperature. Tree life cycles are typically long, some species reproduce only once every 12 or more years, and many trees live for hundreds of years. The longer-term data collected as part of this study are therefore essential to capture a greater part of the tree life cycle and to span variation in weather conditions. The data and models resulting from the study will identify major mechanisms of species co-existence, helping to explain the unusually high diversity in tropical forests.Improved understanding of the factors that govern the abundance of tree species will aid in predicting forest responses to environmental changes, which is critical to timber production, wildlife habitat, and forest carbon storage. Results will also improve predictions of how some of the most diverse communities on the plant respond to warmer temperatures, reduced rainfall and increasing deposition of chemical pollutants. The project will educate and train students, make valuable long-term data publicly available, and promote science education of the general public through activities at Science Festivals and a website.